1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing device and an image processing program that causes a computer to execute image processing, and, more particularly, to an image processing device and an image processing program capable of increasing the compression ratio by raising the repetition of enlarged image data that has been interpolated in an interpolation processing that enlarges a bitmap-expanded image.
2. Description of the Related Art
A printer that prints images created by a host computer is confronted by a variety of strict demands such as low costs, high-speed printing, and high quality printing. More particularly, host-based printers, for which the majority of image processing for printing is performed by the printer driver of the host computer, have been proposed due to cost-reduction demands.
In these host-based printers, a printer driver generates image data, which is expanded into RGB values for each pixel or CMYK values corresponding with the printer toner, from a rendering record that is generated by an application on the host computer, and then compresses and transfers the image data to the printer. The printer expands the received image data, performs binarization such as screen processing, and then produces an image on the print medium by means of a print engine. Because the majority of the image processing is executed by an image processing program on the host computer in line with the increase in host computer performance, the image processing device in the printer controller can be greatly reduced, which can be associated with printer cost reductions. Such a host-based printer is disclosed by Japanese Patent No. 3284464, No. 3367555, and No. 3367556.